The most important aim of the thesis is to find out how strong was the impact of the German economic development on the Czech economy from 1993 to 2005, through what kind of linkages could have been such an impact effective, and what are the future prospects in this field.

The main goal of this diploma thesis was to find similarities and differences in the development of two basic macroeconomic indicators GDP and the unemployment rate. Indicators were analyzed quarterly. Development of Inflation, government spendings, scheduled tax charges, influence FDI on productivity of labour, were taken as relevant factors in the development of analyzed indicators.

We estimate the macroeconomic performance in terms of inflation and GDP growth of Sweden in relations to oil price shocks, focusing on the differences across two periods, pre and post 2008. By using a Vector Error Correction model and linear hypothesis testing we can see short term and long term correlations between the nominal oil price and three dependent variables, GDP, CPI and GDP deflator. Our hypothesis is that the effects of oil price shocks are indifferent across our estimation period and this would be in line with previous literature.  We find that the macroeconomic factors of GDP and inflation responds differently post 2008 and by using impulse response functions (IRFs) we can see how the dependent variables responds to an oil price shock. They show that oil shocks have permanent effects in GDP and GDP deflator but transitory effects in CPI, we found short run causality for GDP and CPI but not for GDP deflator.

This thesis focuses on current approaches to the measurement of poverty. The aim of the thesis is to evaluate if measuring poverty indicators and quality of life indicators used by United Nations Development Programme and Eurostat are meaningful enough. The theoretical part is an analysis of chosen indicators. The theoretical knowledge is followed by practical part, comparing poverty levels in member states of the European Union, and giving deeper insight into the analysis of sub-indicators. Furthermore, the thesis looks at informative value connected to mutual relations among the indicators. The comparison reveals that the level of human development is negatively related to aspects such as insufficient economic growth, inequality and low level of wealth redistribution. From an analytical point of view, new multi-criteria indicators are useful enough for the purpose of research on this topic, in spite of certain imperfections.

The main goal of this dissertation is to explore alternative economic indicators to GDP. The paper also analyses whether GDP is able to capture the development of a society's welfare, and whether different indicators can show other results about the development of national economy. After an introductory description of GDP, the paper outlines the core limits of this indicator. Following this is a discussion of happiness economics and Easterlin's paradox. The paper then goes on to explore the subject of alternative indicators in more detail. In the final chapter, five selected alternative indicators are analyzed, and compared with GDP using the USA's economy as an example. In conclusion, the paper evaluates the usefulness of these alternative indicators and finds that alternative indicators give a different perspective on national economy than GDP.

Competitiveness has been part of central, monetary policy making for over 500 years where regions have aimed to improve competitiveness and productivity by focussing on specific factors. The focus of the research was to identify which factors are most relevant for the African continent on determining competitiveness which will allow policy makers to understand how best to direct their investment with the greatest productivity return. The research methodology was quantitative in nature, based on secondary data from the Global Competitiveness Report over the past five years. The sample included 39 of the 54 African countries which are the countries on which the report collected data from. The unit of analysis was GDP per capita. A multivariate Generalised Linear Model with a log link function and Gamma error structure was built. The results showed that the order of importance for Africa was macroeconomic stability; infrastructure; technological readiness; and market size with the other factors not having a material influence. Building a similar model on all the countries have included two additional factors namely health and primary education as well as higher education and training. This indicates that certain structural factors are more important for countries in the developing phase such as Africa. / Dissertation (MBA)--University of Pretoria, 2014. / lmgibs2015 / Gordon Institute of Business Science (GIBS) / MBA / Unrestricted

While human “wellbeing” has historically been measured by economic growth, traditional metrics do not fit the challenges of the 21st century. Increasingly, decision-makers are adopting new guiding frameworks that encompass a more holistic understanding of wellbeing and progress including concepts such as ecological health and subjective wellbeing. Yet, the development processes and implementation challenges faced by these initiatives - as well as the opportunities for advancement - remain relatively unexamined for state and regional communities. This research considers the implementation and potential of existing wellbeing indicator systems in Vermont. With limited research on wellbeing measurement at the state or local level, this thesis provides novel insight using the state of Vermont as a case study. A better understanding of specific measurement tools, public and political interest in data collection, and shared experiences can help to fill the current gap in the literature and provide useful information for decision-makers. The first article contains a case study analysis of four wellbeing indices at the regional and state level in Vermont: the Vermont Genuine Progress Indicator (GPI), the Vermont Happiness Index, the Chittenden County Environment, Community, Opportunity and Sustainability (ECOS) project, and Vermont Act 186 (the “Outcomes Bill”). The case studies provide contextual background describing the impetus and development of each wellbeing initiative. The similarities, differences, and connections between each case study are further examined based on a general program theory of wellbeing measurement. The second article narrows in on one specific wellbeing index: the 2017 Vermont Happiness Index, a representative statewide survey of subjective wellbeing. The Index is composed of eleven domains of wellbeing, with each domain as an aggregation of 3 or more Likert-scale questions. The survey results are analyzed through statistical testing and recommendations for future research are provided.

Magister Commercii - MCom / This study investigates the effect of public debt on economic growth in South Africa since 1961-2017. Public debt stock is disaggregated into external debt and domestic debt in order to determine the effect of each on economic growth independently. The study employed the ARDL bound test to estimate the long and short run relationship among several macroeconomic variables - real economic growth, domestic debt, external debt, budget deficit, inflation rate and investment. An error correction model was used to analyses the short-run disequilibrium. The results show that there is a short and long run equilibrium relationship between foreign debt, domestic debt, budget deficit, inflation rate and economic growth. The empirical results indicate that external debt negatively affects the real GDP growth in South Africa, both in the short and long-run. Several policy implications emerged from the empirical results. To keep public debt more manageable, South Africa should improve its debt management. Furthermore, the country can make use of debt to equity swaps by privatizing underperforming parastatals. This would make them competitive and efficient.

Despite the growing literature on financial development-economic growth nexus, there exists a paucity of empirical studies that explore the impact of financialisation on economic growth while focusing on the competitiveness of the financial sector. This study examines the revealed comparative advantages of 34 developing African countries from the period 2008 to 2017 and goes further to determine the impact of the revealed comparative advantage indices on economic growth. Revealed comparative advantage is used as an alternative proxy to financialisation, while economic growth is measured in terms of GDP per capita. In order to determine the impact, a panel study approach was followed, using a multiple linear regression model. The study produces two findings. Firstly, we find that the majority of African countries do not reveal a comparative advantage in financial services. This finding confirms our expectation. Secondly, we find that there exists a negative and significant relationship between financialisation and economic growth. The findings suggest that as developing countries in Africa gain comparative advantages in financial services, those gains have a detrimental impact on their economic growth. Informed by the findings of this study, which have implications for financial market development in Africa, the main recommendations are firstly that regulators need to play their part in reducing the cost of business for financial services institutions—particularly compliance costs, so as to encourage competition and development in the financial services sector, without compromising their responsibility to protect consumers. Secondly, better insights regarding cross-border trading and its impact on economic growth, profitability and the accumulation of foreign currency reserves need to be gained, in order to come up with more conducive regulatory frameworks that do not result in penalties for local firms, rendering them uncompetitive relative to foreign firms. Additionally, management at financial institutions have the responsibility of ensuring that benefits derived from their cross-border business go beyond shareholder value, but that reinvestment into the real economy takes place either through increased lending or equity investments and should also ensure that sufficient investments are made into the infrastructure required to increase the institution's competitiveness. Finally, Government and regulators needs to pay attention to how cross-border financial transactions are taxed, especially considering the new era of FinTech's, cryptocurrencies, and deepening regional integration, while at the same time ensuring that there is greater depth, bread and liquidity of their local financial markets.

This diploma thesis deals with the issue of evaluation of economic development in Visegrad group countries compared to Germany in years from 2009 to 2015. The aim of the thesis is to take down and to evaluate economic development in this period based on the analysis of macroeconomic indicators. In the theoretical part, there are several notions explained, such as the definition of GDP, economic growth rate, unemployment rate, balance of payments or economic cycle. In the practical part, there is an analysis carried out which describes the concrete data development of macroeconomic indicators in Visegrad group countries in comparison to Germany. Subsequently, general characteristics of the countries are deduced. At the end of the thesis, the findings are summarized, and further possibilities of elaboration are foreshadowed.